The company brought to the Playhouse last Thursday and Friday two works premiered last month. The first was Brink by dancer Martin Lawrance. Lawrance has been dancing for Alston for 12 years, and this is the second piece he has made for the company.

Richard Alston told me recently that he can't detect anything of his own influence in the piece, but I have to say that I can. However, this is by no means a criticism, since Alston is a contemporary choreographer of the first rank. Influence, yes, but Lawrance does have an individual style - sharp and exciting and very precise.

Brink is a work for six dancers, set to Japanese tango music, which sounds like an up-to-date interpretation of the sensuous, flexible tangos of Argentina. But the dances are not tangos, they are simply Lawrance's response to the spirit of the music. It starts in half-darkness with two bodies interlaced, counter-balanced, the flow interrupted by frozen pauses. A slow central duet between Rose Sudworth and Pierre Tappon begins with the two isolated in their own concentration. Then, to brisker music, they make contact, and dance in a slightly suspicious flirtation, which in feeling, if not in steps, comes close to the mysterious mood of the tango. Throughout its 12 minutes this proves to be an excellent piece, satisfyingly danced.

Alston's own new work is Fingerprint to two early works by Bach. We're in familiar Alston territory here, which means that it's all very beautiful to look at, as the dances vary according to the tempo of the music. Although it's an abstract work, emotions vary too, from the measured, noble opening solo for Martin Lawrance, through an intense, close-up duet for Rosie Sudworth and Pierre Tappon, a rhapsodic slow duet for the elegant Yolande Yorke-Edgell and Lawrance, which ends in an emotional embrace, and a lighter trio, before the whole cast bring the work to a close.

Opening the programme was Alston's highly successful Red Run, and to close it we had The Devil in Detail with the stylish dancers breathing fresh life into Scott Joplin's piano rags.